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2014-10-25 - Fire!
The skyline of New York is iconic; many pictures are sold worldwide of the skyscrapers, with the city lights sparkling in a deceptive peacefulness. A watcher looking on tonight would be able to take that picture again, though not for very long. Near to the airport there is a large building, dedicated to law. Steel and glass from the ground up, a monument to modern civilization. The night is shattered by a scream as a woman's voice rings out, "Look! In the window!" If a person, or a hero, would look they would see on the tenth floor, flickering flames in a window that draw the eye just in time for the explosion that takes out a section of the building and engulfs the ninth through eleventh floor with flame! Nightwing was in New York hoping for a nice relaxing day off. Sadly it seems ot not be what fate has in store. He does not look in the window but when he hers the explosion he ducks into someplace private to change inot his costume. New suit, new shoes, got a whole new attitude. Jason's young again, fresh and free. The moment there's that flicker of a fire, is the same moment he pulls back down his black balaclava to cover his features. Running up to a window on the back of the building Jason wraps his hand in a small bit of cloth smashing it open shards of glass crashing down to the ground on the other side. Kara Zor-El was about 10 blocks away, getting yelled at by a truck driver. Why? Because she had landed in front of the truck to prevent him from hitting a little kid who had tripped and fallen in the street. The truck drive himself could have probably stopped if he hadnt been on a 28 hour shift. The result? A truck's broken engine block like it had hit into a wall instead of the Kryptonian girl's hand. While the four year old's mother was very thankful, the driver of the big rig was not. "You destroyed my truck! Stupid capes always causing damage and who pays for it? The working class man, that's who! You stupid -" It pretty much goes on like that, folks. With the mother yelling at the truck driver, and the truck driver yelling at Kara. Kara rubs the bridge of her nose while this guy let off some steam yelling at her. Internal Mantra? Don't flick him in the forehead, he did just lose his truck. And thinking to herself it might have been a better idea to just grab the child instead. Thank Rao when she hears the explosion. Good excuse to fly off. A figure is visible in the flames, attracting some attention and the flash of some photography as celphones are whipped out. Very few, oddly, are used to phone the FIRE DEPARTMENT. No, they are used to record the event since someone else must, of course, be calling for help. I mean there's celphones out all around. The figure is silhouetted in the flames, literally dumping some kind of liquid about that makes the fire spread rapidly, and then the person vanishes into the building, going INTO the fire which is spreading through the entire tenth floor and moving up and down in the building quickly. Screams of panic from inside the building draw attention, but that red-hooded figure doesn't seem to be a very likely source of help. Inside the first floor, Jason finds that the building fire alarm has not yet been pulled, so the first floor inhabitants have no idea that there's any issue at all! There are always people working, and the building is not unoccupied. For that matter, they seem to wonder what the crashing noise is. Breaking glass? On Kara's arrival, she finds the building as described. She can see many people in the fire, several in very immediate and potentially lethal danger as the flames spread. Nightwing noitces the figure. He has dealt with a few flame weilding villians in his time, and he starts to scale the building trying to get to the man spreading the fire. The fire alarm is pulled shortly after Jason's break in, by the man himself, if nothing else it'll be a bit of a distraction. There's an expedience in his actions, and the moment he's pulled the alarm, he's already off to try and get to where the fire is proper. If anyone tries to stop him they're going to find themselves on the floor. Kara Zor-El arrives at the scene, flying nearby the building. She'd put it out with superbreath, or possibly a force clap, but saw that there were still people inside. After the incident with the truck driver, it was probably a better idea to figure out ways to reduce collateral damage. Definitely if people might get hurt in the process. X-Ray Vision - One thing she does notice is ... okay is that Dick? Yes, it's Nightwing in there! And.... someone breaking INTO the building. Seriously, building is exploding and on fire... and you're going to try to loot the place? She frowns at that, making a note to stop him after finding the person who caused the fire. But first thing's first - civilians. Kara flies down at the building, catching one person as they're trying to jump out the window to escape the flames, and set him down on the building next door, before flying back into the flames to look for others. The fire is still confined to just the ninth, tenth and eleventh floors. The building was built to be hard to burn down, which is making the firestarter's job harder. That being said, Nightwing and Kara being close enough would be able to smell a distinctive scent; napalm. On the first floor, Jason finds a stair access since it's not a good idea to use an elevator during a major fire. He also finds a security guard, who looks at Jason: Person wearing a balaclava over his head, broken glass sounds a moment ago, some form of thump and the fire alarm? He pulls out his gun and orders Jason to stop where he stands! Nightwing fast approaches the level of the blaze, with people looking out the windows at him with surprise. Most of them are ignoring the fire alarm, which has just started going off. Some conscientious citizen must have pulled the alarm. Of course, it's not quite certain what Nightwing will DO outside the building, as cinders fall toward him. However he does notice that every floor seems to have some kind of celebration; flowers, in vases, all with 'We miss you Kristy' on them. In every room. Kara's vision tells her that there are four people in immediate danger in the floors on fire. Two have collapsed already due to smoke inhalation, one is trapped by fire, and another is apparently out cold for an unrelated reason with a bottle in his hand. No judgement from the narrator on the timing. Nightwing notices ht e decorations, "Interesting." he says then he gets to work once he notices Kara is on the scen he starts ot call out directions ot hte people he notices. In one room not yet on fire he opens a windo to enter the building heads to the one of the vases to check them out. There's no time to wait Jason would love to be the good guy here, he's always been a fan of being the good guy, but every second he's here is another that someone is without oxygen. He holds his hands up in the air, just to show him unarmed, the fact that he's not having nothing to do with this. Slowly moving towards him Jason tries to keep himself nonthreatening, waiting for his moment to strike, the plan being to toss him right out the door to safety and keep going. Kara Zor-El finds the first two who are unconscious, scooping them up as she flies through the building at superspeed and placing them both outside by one of the ambulances that have pulled up. She says to the EMT that there's a third guy on the building who might need to be looked at too. Before flying back inside, looking for the other two civilians she saw earlier with the x-ray scan. She pauses at that point, seeing that there's also a guard with a gun on the guy who broke in to loot the place. Okay, one less thing for her to worry about she supposes. She looks around for Nightwing also and sees him directing a group to safety. The fire seems to be slowing; napalm vs construction designed to stop fire, the engineers seem to have done their job pretty well. Sealing doors keep the fire from moving from room to room, and once Kara has gotten the folks to safety there doesn't appear to be more. Overall, this could have been a great deal worse. Down on the bottom floor, Jason's current admirer (the guard) lowers his gun slightly, allowing Jason the chance to do a disarm and throw or whatever he chooses. The guard is trained, but not exactly prepared for someone of this level, and Jason is through and on his way to the emergency as quickly as he chooses to be. Two floors down from the major blaze, Nightwing stops to inspect the overly present vases. Opening one, he gets an odd smell. A familiar scent in the air, to someone trained in these things. Thermite. A moment later, one of those very vases, two floors up, gets caught in napalm, sending an immediate cascade of liquid flame down onto a girder, slicing through it in seconds...the sound is easily audible to Kara's hearing. Nightwing speaks over the comminicaators in his mask, "Oracle patch me through to Kara." Once thatis done he speaks, "Kara, this is nightwisg there are vase with flowers for Kristy, they are a big part of the problem get them out of hear." he the n grabs the one near him and head towards he widow, it need to get out of hte building now. Kara Zor-El was just about to fly to knock out the thug who just knocked out the guard, when she sees a girder suddenly start crashing through the ceilings and floors, about to crash on Nightwing. The girder smashes through the ceiling and stops, after Kara flies in and grabs it overhead. She gives a little wave at Nightwing with her free hand. "Which vases?" she says, taking a moment to through the girder out from one of the holes in the side of the building and up into the sky. Don't worry true believers, it's not going to be coming back down. She lands nearby Nightwing and mentions, "I could put out the fire but there's still a guard a few rooms away and some thief who decided to break in to loot the place. He just knocked out the guard. Was going to go get him when I saw your girder problem." It all happens in a bit of a blur, a dangerous dance over in almost no time flat. One second the mans lowering his gun the next he's flung through a partially opened door out onto the sidewalk. Lives are at stake and at this point he's not a single clue that other hero's are on the scene, so far as he knows he's the only one on the scene, and he's moving fast as his legs will carry now. Far in the background, fire trucks can be heard just starting to leave from the fire department location for this area. With traffic, they will be roughly ten minutes too late to save the building if more of the thermite traps go off; not that they could do much if they were on site once those have gone off. Nightwing and Kara hear another of the little toys go off, giving them an idea of the general plan of this event. Light a fire on the tenth floor where there are no vases, then escape while it spreads. When the fire reaches the eighth floor, giving the arsonist plenty of time to get out of the building, the whole building goes up in a river of thermite. The guard finds himself on the street, bewildered but generally unhurt. Shouts follow Jason up the stairwell as he runs upward toward the fire and the lives in danger, but the guards don't follow. Jason runs up the stairwell, hearing someone coming down ahead of him. Whoever it is seems to be heavily laden and, as Jason turns the corner, he runs directly into a man in a red suit with a gas mask, carrying a ...flamethrower. Nightwing says to Kara, "Get rid of the flowers, all of them." he tells her, "They go off and looting will not matter." he then says, "I will head to take care of the looter. You save the building." he then moves ot intercept the looter aka Jason Lucky. Jason's no genius, but he knows enough that when you see a fire, and you see a man with a flamethrower the two may be related. The worst case scenario runs through his mind of this being some sort of hero, but for the time being he's willing to live with that, and goes in for the attack. There's only one way to find out, Man with flamethrower meet floor, floor meet man with flame thrower. Kara Zor-El nods "On it." She grabs one of the oversized vases, and is gone in a blur. Rather than tossing them after the girder, she takes it to an abandonned construction lot a few blocks away. Thermite in a vase - too many implications of it breaking and showing everyone with thermite otherwise. Plus maybe Batman or Oracle or someone can trace it or something. The same thing happens with the second vase. Blur, it's gone. Then the third. Then fourth, then fifth. By the time she's done, while Nightwing is encountering the looter and the flamethrower guy, she's made a grouping of 50 vases in the abandonned lot and looks at them, arms crossed. "Okay, that could have done a LOT of damage if it ignited." she says to herself before getting ready to go back to the building. Having reached the villain first, Jason finds himself alone for a short while, dealing with what appears to be a person in a full-length fireproof suit, with a helmet, red eyes, and a handheld flamethrower. The man turns the weapon in Jason's direction as he attacks, trying to get in a line of monologue before getting interrupted. The weapon spits flame and napalm, sticking to Jason's coat, but Jason gets in underneath it and is able to get a shot in on Firefly while he's inside the arsonist's range. Nightwing starts down the stairs FAST, guided by Kara's instructions. He hears sounds of a fight a few floors down, but isn't there yet. Kara's vision scanning the building shows a few things. 1: the primary fire is still blazing, but nobody is really in danger from it anymore. Just things, and there is nobody left on those three floors. 2: The canisters of thermite which DID manage to get triggered are causing a fair bit of damage, and there is a group of businessmen ignoring the fire alarm who are about to get a hot shower. 3: there are still a LOT of thermite vases, but they are all too low in the building to be in danger of getting set off. The fire just won't ever reach them. Nightwing bounds down the stairs using his acrobatic ability ot spead the process as much as he can, after all he has an idea about who set this off. He has seen Fireflys's work before, after all he was a Gotham rouge for a while. So he's on fire now, well it was to be expected as Jason gets his jab into the mans gut. Jason lets the fire stick for a bit, ripping off his jacket, before using the flaming remains as a weapon in and of itself, trying and failing to rip the flame thrower out of the mans hands. The downside is that now he's got a bright white shirt on underneath to worry about so blending into the shadows won't be as easy this second time. Kara Zor-El flies back to the building and looks at it for a moment. All civilians except the looter are clear. Nightwing's still in there, as well as, apparently, the fire starter. But Nightwing will be able to protect them from this - the fire is now the big concern before it spreads to another building. Kara purses her lips together and blows at it, making sure to chill the superbreath a bit - enough to put out the flames without freezing the building (or the three people still inside). The fire is put out quickly by Supergirl's breath, the flames fighting to stay alive against the unstoppable girl's chilling ability. They fail. The fire is out, the building is safe. Just as the fire trucks clear the light and start pulling up to the building. Hooray! Between the third and fourth floor, Firefly curses as he's jabbed in the stomach by Jason. He tries to get past the man, snarling, "Back off, I don't have time for a rookie," as he tries to slam Jason in the head with his weapon. Nightwing, clearing the corner with an acrobatic slide down the bannister, sees what appears to be a person in a balaclava and a white t-shirt sparring off against Firefly in the stairwell, beneath him. Kara should probably take note that the group of businessmen on the second floor that were mentioned earlier are about to get a spray of fiery thermite on their heads from above. They don't appear to care about little things like fire alarms. Nightwing sees the fight and vaults over the side of the bansister intending ot let gravity take him into Firefly he curlsing int oa ball to prepare for the impact with the villian. A low growling snarl of a voice, from an old soldier pipes up from Jason, his eyes burning with that sort of look that says more 'I'm going to kill you' then it does 'I'm going to take you in', as he catches the rifle butt and uses the mans own momentum to send him down towards the ground. "You're about to wish I was a rookie," It's one of the key ideals in Hapkido, and unfortunately he slams firefly into the ground very hard just as nightwing would have hit him square in the back. This is going to hurt Jason, A lot. The businessmen at their table are suddenly finding the room to be a great deal hotter than expected, as the thermite from above breaks through their ceiling. Luckily they slip back out of the way before anyone is badly hurt, and finally start to get the idea that they should leave the building. "Uh...might be best to table this for later." In the stairwell, things progress. Pose on, folks. I might note that Nightwing is excellent in the air, and suggest that he has some control over his impact. Firefly, slammed to the floor, lets out a gasp as he's stunned by the impact. The throw was a good one, and he apparently needs a moment to get his breath back. Sliding down the stairs a bit, he ends up on a landing, in apparent pain. He might get up, but it'll take him a moment. Nightwing sees the looter throw firefly down, sicne he can tel lthe looter is not in any sort of armoer he stretchs out, he cannot fly but this will spread the impact and make it hurt less. Well that's one way to knock the wind out of someone. Jason takes both legs right to the chest, being knocked down the stairs, and on top of poor Firefly on the landing. Not able to talk as well as he'd hoped Jason calls out to Nightwing, "Need- Evacuate, fire" trying to catch his breath. Kara Zor-El pauses. "Actually, I just put the fire out." Nightwing gets back ot his feet his his bruised some but his uniform handled most ofhte impace on his end, "So what are you doing here?" he asks, "It is odd that a lotter would stop an arsonist." he moves down the stairs ot put zip cuffs on Firefly. "Saving lives" Jason claims, trying to pull his face mask up slightly so he can actually get a bit of a breather. "If you hadn't been" Another deep breath, the top of his chest tattoo's now actually visible from where the mask had been covering. "Not everyone can afford a mask," Kara Zor-El pauses, looking at Jason. "Yes, the piece of cloth definitely sets Nightwing here back a lot of money." Nightwing looks at the tattoe then to Jason, "Well a mask might help, though the tattos would make keeping a secret hard." hethen says, "A tatoo artists style is almost like a finger print."